ended it listening to the most perfect
concert programme at Queen's Hall that I have ever heard.... Was it not
a happy day?" The answer, Filson, is in the affirmative.

***

Forty years ago, L1,000 a year was spent on wines and spirits at the
Medway (Chatham) Workhouse and Infirmary, while to-day the annual
expenditure is only L5. In these hard times even paupers have to
economise.

***

St. Mark's Church, Tunbridge Wells, which has been troubled with a
plague of flies, has had to be closed for a week for the purpose of
fumigation. Many members of the congregation had complained of being
kept awake by these vivacious insects.

***

Apparently the modistes have resolved that this shall be a butcher's
year, for we are promised leg-of-mutton sleeves, ham-frill skirts, and
pork-pie hats.

***

Although M. Jean Worth, the famous creator of fashions, has declared
that the mania of modern women for changing styles of dress amounts to a
disease, it is not, we understand, the present intention of any of the
leading dressmaking firms to offer a prize for a cure for this ailment.

***

M. Worth also stated that "Quality, not quantity," is the right motto
for women in matters of dress. For all that, we trust that the
irreducible minimum has now been reached.

***

According to the calculations of a M. Verronet, the earth has only
another two million years to live. We hope that the effect of this
statement may not be to encourage jerry-building.

***

[Illustration: "Lend us a 'and wiv this, will yer, Mister? Muvver wants
'im 'ome and 'e's that 'eadstrong!"]

* * * * *

THE CRITIC AT THE R.A.

"Talking of treacle pudding," said Felicity, helping that delicacy with
a grace and skill that would have demanded the entire concentration of
one less gifted--"talking of treacle pudding, I suppose you've done the
Academy?"

"Not yet," I confessed.

She looked at me reproachfully.

"Dear, dear," she sighed, "when will the British Public awaken to the
claims of Art? We haven't either."

"I generally wait a bit and find out which are the pictures I am
expected to admire."

"And a very sensible plan too," she rejoined; "that is, for you and me
and the rest of the common herd. Of course Papa's different. He's a
critic."

Her father coughed deprecatingly.

"When he sees anything really artistic," she went on, "it fills him with
del